Monitoring the health of civil infrastructure

Recent advances in smart materials and structures embedded sensor technology offer many unique opportunities to assess the structural integrity of civil structures. However, the remote operational environment of large civil structures such as highways, buildings, and bridges, makes condition-based health monitoring for damage assessment difficult in the event of a natural disaster. During such disasters, electrical power is lost and phone lines are under heavy usage. This limits the retrieval of very important sensor data. However, recent rulings by the Federal Communication Commission coupled with advances in wireless communication products has now made it possible to circumvent existing wired and cellular infrastructure to retrieve data from smart sensors remotely and more economically. This paper discusses an ongoing effort to develop an inexpensive wireless monitoring system for civil infrastructure.